61-year-old IT consultant who laid dead in his apartment for two weeks identified

Ian White, 61, was discovered in his Dublin flat last August after the landlord of the building was alerted to an intense smell. A year later, the corpse has been definitively identified using DNA obtained from his mother.

The Irish Independent reports that White, who is originally from Jersey but had been living in Ireland for at least ten years, was identified using a DNA sample from his mother, Ethel Hanks, who still lives in Jersey.

White, an unemployed IT consultant, had been described as a quiet person who kept to himself by the Ballybough Road’s property’s landlord Michael Delaney.

Landlord Delaney was first notified of the smell in the property on August 19, 2011. A week later, another tenant complained of the smell.

Using his master key, Delaney let himself into White’s flat to find a corpse, blackened, laying near the doorway. Officials believe White’s body could have been there for about two weeks.

Though the coroners were not able to determine a cause of death as the body had been so decomposed already, no foul play was suspected. Further, White had visited Mater Hospital in the weeks prior to his death complaining of chest pains, which were dismissed as strained muscles.